Dreamcast/Homebrew

Contents

As hackers figured how to boot the Dreamcast from regular CDs without any hardware modding, it became, by all practical means, the most open console ever. That is, until intentionally open consoles came out, such as the Linux-based Caanoo and many Android-based portables, but I digress. Retaining a devoted fanbase even after it was commercially discontinued, it was the platform of choice for many independent developers. Thus it received several original titles, as well as ports and emulators.

Even though the system has been dead for 15+ years, don't forget to check the Upcoming games page
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Box Art

Title

Genre

Description

Where to obtain

Alice's Mom's Rescue

Platformer

Cute retro puzzle platformer, vaguely inspired by "Alice in Wonderland". A little girl has to traverse huge maze-ish levels and rescue her mommy from the giant raven. Magical mushrooms allow her to trip balls change size to reach different areas.

Clone-sorta-ish of the Streets of Rage series, done with KOF sprites. As the engine is open and very easy to mess, several modded versions exist. To save on CD-Rs, look for the "Beats of Rage Collection" packs. Also on several other platforms.

YOUR ARE CUTE! DIE IN HELL! Clearly inspired by Turrican, but plot-wise a sequel to Last Hope. This is probably the most epic and ambitious indie game for the Dreamcast ever released. Also on the Neo Geo.

Even though Last Hope got some praise as a fine-looking and very challenging game in the same vein as Pulstar, it was also criticized as too brutally difficult and somewhat glitchy; this updated version corrects the original release's issues.

A Dreamcast port (because why the hell not?) of the old-school 2D platformer. Strongly reminiscent of arcade classic Rastan, but even more difficult. Unlike its releases on virtually every platform, the Dreamcast port is legally free!

One of the many "post-mortem" commercially released indie games, the aim of this puzzler is to match elemental squares into matching diamond shapes in a manner somewhat reminiscent of Tetris Attack / Panel de Pon / Puzzle League games (fuck me does that series have a lot of names). As those games are in their own right - Wind and Water Puzzle Battles is ridiculously addictive and graphically attractive considering it's a port from the GP32 of all things.

Don't let the cover throw you off, this isn't a Jap-only game, it has full English as well and is region free.

As many Dreamcast games were much smaller than a CD's capacity, pirates have figured out how to make multi-game compilations. Where to get them? Hint, hint: RetroZone.co, Segahub, CoolROM, DopeRoms, Rom Hustler.

One of THE best compilations for the little system that could. Includes: Capcom vs. SNK 2 (JP), Marvel vs. Capcom 2 (US/JP), Street Fighter III 3rd Strike (US/JP), Puzzle Fighter II X (Translated US/JP), Super Street Fighter II X (Translated US/JP), and the Capcom Taisen Fan Disk (JP, With some ENG text). And as there was still some room to spare, they included Ikaruga, Action Replay, and Game Shark.

Includes: KOF 99, KOF 2000, and KOF 2002. Not all of the Dreamcast's KOFs, but still worth a look into. All games are JP, but the only reading needed is for victory texts, so it's all good. Also includes music and best save data files built in.

Bleem!, the famed commercial PlayStation emulator for PC, came to the Dreamcast in three game-specific releases: Gran Turismo 2, Metal Gear Solid, and Tekken 3. It provided that serious visual upgrade (640x480, anti-aliasing, bilinear filtering) that the PS2 should but did not. There is also a non-title-specific leaked beta, but it was an early version, very buggy and incomplete, with spotty compatibility.[1]

Dream SNES

SNES

Has a fucton of SNES games now. 2-player capabilities as well, along with various genre's of games. There are stand alone genre's of this comp such as Dreamsnes RPG'S, but this one has all types of gaming genre's from the SNES era, so fuck year!

Neo4All

Neo Geo CD

An impressive feat of coding: a Neo Geo CD emulator, running pretty much perfect at full speed on the Dreamcast. And it is possible to create standalone game+emulator discs. (Hint, there's a lot of those out there.)

Nester DC

NES

A fuck-ton of old NES games with 2-player capability! Sadly battletoads, and battletoads double dragon aren't working as of now, so FUCK! Other games don't work like the Batman NES games as well as the compilation missing some games, even if some of those missing suck ass, but AVGN makes us want to play those sucky ass games, y'know?

Remember all the times you got online with your DC and went to GameFAQs or Planetweb, just to get some useful VMU save file? Ever wonder how to do that now, as no one uses dial-up anymore? Here's a more elegant solution: a disc with a fuckton of save files! Just boot to it, copy the files you want to the VMU, and you're done.

Plays some games that do not have the auto-boot function enabled in their ISO, along with legit games from other regions. There are 3 versions, 1.1, 1.3, and 1.5. Like it says, do not buy this cd, if you did, you have been cheated.